Cliff Barron here with my weekly update for Milton, Georgetown and Glen Williams for the week of October 11th to the 17th. Before I get there though - last week I talked about waiving the home inspection as part of a multiple offer situation, in order to give yourself a better chance of winning the bidding.  However, I forgot to mention that I know there are a lot of new agents that follow me on here and so I wanted to say something to make sure everybody is covered. One thing you should do when you're writing up an offer for your clients - you should always include the home inspection and the financing clause and then cross it out and have it initialed by your clients.  This is so that they can acknowledge that they're fully aware of the risks they're taking in waiving the home inspection. You don't want them coming back just in case they buy the house and then there is a problem. You never know, because there could be, like I said in the video, and you don't want them coming back saying hey, you never told us that we waived our home inspection - we didn't know that.  But if it's crossed out and initialed by your clients, then it's obvious that you've had that conversation with them and you're good. 

So this week,  I'd like to talk about finishing your basement. I get that question all the time. Is it worth it? Does it add value to the home? There's a popular show on TV, where they're always putting an income suite into a basement and they say, "Oh, we'll spend $50,000 on it."  And then mysteriously, an agent comes in and says, "Your house is now worth $100,000 more."  I'm going to be perfectly honest with you - it's not true.  A lot of the time, you'll put $50,000 into finishing your basement as an income suite, and then you decide to sell it. If you're going to sell it immediately, you might profit a little bit, but you could be cutting out a lot of potential buyers. Many people don't want another family in their basement. If they're a single family home, they want their kids to enjoy the basement or they may want to finish it the way they want it. That's one thing to keep in mind. 

Secondly - is finishing your basement to sell a home actually get more for the sale? It's not really going to happen. The rule of thumb is whatever is below grade is worth a third above grade. So in other words, if you have a 2000 square foot home and you have an 800 square foot basement, that's equivalent to about 250 square feet above grade.  So, you've turned your 2000 square foot home into a 2200 square foot home. You've increased the value a little bit, but you've probably increased it the amount you just spent finishing your basement, to be honest. So that's another thing to keep in mind. 

I've had clients in the past where I've talked to them on the phone (you know, before texting and that sort of stuff) and I always do a rundown before I meet them. I ask, "What kind of finishes do you have in your house? What kind of upgrades?"  And they say, "I have a finished basement. I immediately think, okay, adds a little bit of value. And then I go see the house.  Occasionally I've seen it where it's the homeowners that have finished it. And sometimes it's so bad that it actually has to be ripped out and done again. I remember when I walked into one home and the ceiling actually got lower the further you walked. The homeowner was very proud of the work he'd done - he'd done it all himself (you could tell) and approximately $20,000 of his own money and labor and working on it. But in the end, that was actually a negative because they had to spend maybe $2000-$3000 in bin rentals and everything to dispose of all of it and do it over again. So, that wasn't a good situation. 

I have had a few though, where clients have done their basement themselves. I had one recently where they did a phenomenal job and it was better than most contractors I've seen.  If you can do it at a great price, you're okay. But he did it himself which was really fortunate because he was very skilled at it. If you can't do it yourself, then you're basically going to break even. What it does do is it helps to sell that house faster. An important point if you choose to finish the basement is make sure you put a three-piece bathroom in: a shower, a toilet and a sink. You need that. Then, if there's ever an inlaw coming to stay or anything like that, a bedroom suite in the basement would be good.  And one thing to think about too, though, the way things are going right now with the prices going up and up and up, there's a chance that basement apartments might become valuable.  Over time, if it keeps going up the way it is, people are going to need helpers in the basement, to help pay the mortgage basically. So that's one thing to consider. But as of now, they don't really add a lot of value. Basically, whatever money you put in, you're going to get out, but you're going to go through the dust and the dirt and the grind and everything to get it ready. 

So, in a nutshell, I wouldn't recommend to add value, but if you want to sell the house faster, it's a good way to do it.  So, off to the sales in Georgetown & Glen Williams for October 11th to 17th - things are still good - it's still busy. We're still up over last year (26 sales) and this year 43. We're slowing down a little bit- last week there was 48 sales, but that's typical for this time of year after Thanksgiving you get close to Halloween and things start to slow down a little bit. There were 26 detached sold, 11 townhouses and 5 semis. The detached were $1.174 on average, 12 days on the market. 11 towns -they've gone up a lot, $789k on average, 4 days on the market and 5 semis $840k on average, 6 days on the market. As you can see, things are still moving. It's still moving well, but I can feel it slowing a little bit. And that's judging by my listings and the number of showings they're starting to slow down a little bit. But that could be the time of year.  Prices have gone up so much that there could be buyers fatigue and they're sort of saying, "I'm going to take a break for a while." That's a possibility too. 

And then we get to Georgetown and Glen Williams. There was 19 sales the past week as opposed to 14 last year. And actually Georgetown has kind of stayed busier than Milton. Last week there were 20 sales and this week 19. So it hasn't slowed as much as Milton. 15 detached at $1.016 on average, 7 days on the market and 4 towns at $697k, 7 days on the market. So basically prices are still improving a little bit, but not as much as they were, which is good because we don't want it going up too quick. Because whenever it goes up real quick, it comes down real quick.  A nice steady growth would be good. So that's it. Any questions, let me know. Hopefully this information is handy for you - any questions, let me know. Thanks, take care.